The associations among Neuroticism, self-rated health, and mortality were examined in a national sample of 1,472 women initially aged 45 to 64 and followed over a 16 year period. Self-rated health was related to Neuroticism, which was unrelated to mortality. However, self-rated health was a significant prospective risk factor for all-cause mortality, net of other risk factors. Efforts to relate basic research on personality to applications in clinical psychology and studies of the relation of personality to physical health will continue.